Parents in San Jose's Washington neighborhood have been asking San Jose Unified for a middle school for years. Kids have to ride a bus or walk several miles to school, and parents, most of them Latino, want them closer to home as they enter their teen years.

This winter the district thought it had the answer. It approved a middle school charter for Downtown College Prep, which already operates two high schools and a middle school in San Jose -- and it hoped to put it on the Washington Elementary campus. Twenty-six of the 80 fifth-grade families at the school had already signed up.

But intense opposition to the charter from other parents and staff scuttled the plan last month. District officials decided that while the school academically was the right choice, it would be too divisive.

Liliana Munoz and her son, Daniel Ibarra, 10, at Ernesto Galarza Elementary School in San Jose, Calif., March 31, 2014. Munoz wants Daniel to attend Downtown College Prep middle school next year.
(Gary Reyes, Mercury News)

That was probably for the best. The fight was so bitter that some DCP supporters still are afraid to speak publicly. But many families will lose out. There is no guarantee the district itself can create a K-8 school on the campus, which is what all the parents say they want.

This was typical of brutal battles over charter schools across Silicon Valley. School districts need to find ways to deal with proposals more effectively.

San Jose Unified is not known as charter-friendly, but administrators thought the turnkey middle school and DCP's history of working with lower-income Latino families would be good for Washington. They failed to respond effectively to opposition, however.

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Some opposition was rooted in the recent fight over Rocketship Education's failed plan to build an elementary school nearby. Brett Bymaster, an activist who had joined San Jose Unified in suing to stop that charter, helped lead the charge.

Bymaster is a conspiracy theorist, and a lot of what he says is misleading. For example, he told us DCP planned to put 420 middle school students on the Washington campus, but that was never the case: 420 was the maximum number set in the charter petition written before a site was chosen.

Bymaster also said he worried the school would draw gang members from neighboring areas. But his biggest complaint about charters is they skim the best students from traditional public schools. That's not your gangster demographic.

Bymaster won the day because San Jose Unified was unprepared to counter irrational fears among Washington residents or to make sure the families who supported DCP were heard.

These challenges are common across Silicon Valley. Some districts, such as Franklin-McKinley, work well with charters. In others -- Morgan Hill, for example -- opposition has hardened over time.

The charter movement also is blundering into some problems of its own making.

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings' recent idiotic comments calling for private corporations to run all public schools are seriously damaging the movement, affirming fears of loss of public and parental control. And in San Jose, Rocketship's ambitious expansion plans overreached and have fed fear that charters run roughshod over public agencies.

Not every charter school is good, but some of Silicon Valley's are excellent. Far from swiping the best students, they target kids left behind by traditional public schools. Thousands of families want their children to go to charters, in many cases because they believe they'll be safer there.

Franklin-McKinley's successful partnerships show what's possible. Districts like San Jose Unified should be able to work with quality charter schools like Downtown College Prep as well to achieve goals that parents embrace.

But the district needs a strategy to overcome mountains of misinformation and allow for a fair debate. If it figures this out, lots of others should be lining up for lessons.